Author Brief

Dear Readers,

The in-game versions of Miria and Necrothirst are part of their guild's raiding team, and as a result must get to 90 as quickly as possible. I will be spending all my time and energy leveling and gearing for when the raids drop next Tuesday. Adventurers for Hire is going on a short two-week break until everything is settled. Kyladriss and Kaster must get to 90 eventually, but they are the second priority and I will be able to level them around my writing schedule.

Since the story takes place late in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion, there will be no mention of pandaren, pandaria or monks. That will come much later, after the story moves through the death of Arthas, the Cataclysm, and the fall of Deathwing.

Thank you,
- Emma

Solstice Village

False dawn threw long shadows across Sasha’s modest camp before Laiza and Saelessa returned. Despite himself, Necrothirst started to worry when the horizon turned blush pink and there was still no sign of either death knight.

Finally, Laiza rode into camp on her Deathcharger. Necrothirst stopped pacing around the campfire and strode over to her, his jaw tight. “The worgen?”

“Saelessa is coming with her,” Laiza said. “She’ll need stitches. The beast put up one hell of a fight.”

“I thought that was what the tranquilizer was for,” Necrothirst said, eyeing Sasha sidelong.

The human glared back at him. “It works,” she said. “It’s not my fault if your knights can’t shoot.”

Laiza shrugged. “That’s what it was,” she said. “We had to get close enough to actually stick her with it, and - ah, here they are.”

Saelessa came out of the treeline slowly, the reins of her Deathcharger in her hand. Over its saddle was a thin female worgen, dark gray in color. She wore the tattered remains of a simple cotton dress. Saelessa herself moved stiffly with exaggerated care.

Epyon came forward to gather the worgen, throwing her over his shoulder with little effort. Saelessa’s mount vanished in a puff of smoke, and before she could collapse Tamasi was at her side, drawing the night elf’s arm over her shoulders. “Where are you hurt?”

“My back,” Saelessa said, her voice tight.

Tamasi looked around the camp. Epyon and Laiza stood guard over the prisoner - having two of them there was necessary, especially since Anatoly recognized his wife immediately and looked ready to pounce on Sasha at any moment. Tamasi’s eyes met Necrothirst’s and narrowed. “I require your assistance,” she said.

Necrothirst didn’t move for a moment, staring Tamasi down. The draenei didn’t give any ground. Her words in the firelight of the night rang in his ears - Saelessa was simply a sentinel.

Saelessa was sagging by the moment, and Tamasi pressed her lips together in a thin line, looking like she wanted to take Necrothirst to task but was holding it in out of respect for his station as her commander. Once again Necrothirst was impressed - this time, it was with her loyalty to her sister in death, and her equal loyalty to her commanding officer.

“Very well,” he said grudgingly, coming forward, “but only because it is you that requests it.”

Tamasi didn’t look like she cared why he’d decided to help. She helped Saelessa grab hold of Necrothirst’s arms, until the two night elves stood in what resembled an embrace - Saelessa sagged against his chest, her arms looped around his.

Necrothirst glared down at the top of her head simply out of reflex. He hadn’t been this close to one of his own kind for many long centuries and he only endured it now because, despite himself, he respected Tamasi and she had requested it of him directly.

The draenei ignored his glaring, behaving like there was nothing odd or uncomfortable about the situation. She knelt down behind Saelessa until she was eye-level with the wound and hissed through her teeth. Necrothirst craned his neck so he could see.

Three long gashes laid the flesh of Saelessa’s lower back open so deeply he could see the white flash of bone. “How did you manage to let that thing get behind you?” he asked.

“We thought she was unconscious,” Saelessa grunted. “We - ouch, Tamasi, be careful - didn’t realize the tranquilizer took a few moments to become effective. She lured us in by pretending it was an instant effect, and then as soon as I turned my back on her...”

“Stop talking,” Tamasi said. She was pushing the edges of the wounds together, trying to find the best way to stitch them back together. Unlike a wound on a mortal person, there was no blood flowing from it. Around the edges of the gashes pooled the dark, congealed substance that sat stagnant in a death knight’s veins - blood, but without a heartbeat to drive it. The flesh would not knit together on its own. Saelessa would have to change and maintain the stitching for the rest of her undeath. Tamasi sat back on her hooves and went through her packs looking for the curved bone needle and thick thread every death knight carried with them. One never knew when one would have to re-attach a limb or stitch a wound like this closed.

Saelessa tightened her hands on Necrothirst’s arms and hissed to keep from flinching when Tamasi stabbed the needle into her flesh. While the draenei worked to close the wounds, Necrothirst turned his attention to the group guarding the prisoners. “Is the female awake yet?” he asked.

“She’s coming around,” Epyon said. He stood guard over Anatoly, who crouched on his haunches glaring murder at him. Laiza and Sasha stood over Tatjana, Sasha with her rifle trained on the worgen’s head. Tatjana was indeed moving, stirring a little and sitting up slowly with the heel of her clawed hand pressed to her forehead.

“Kyladriss is our first objective,” Necrothirst said.

“Understood,” Epyon said. His sword was out of his sheath, but he held it down by his side. He was ready to react if Anatoly tried anything, but he seemed to be trying not to provoke the beast.

“Worgen,” Laiza said, and Tatjana’s eyes snapped to the gnome, narrowing in a fierce glare. Laiza was unfazed. “We’re looking for one of our order, a Knight of the Ebon Blade. She was last seen with a worgen - we assume of your pack. They moved in this direction. Have you seen her? Speak!”

Tatjana laughed, a gruff barking noise that sounded not at all human or feminine. “The Lich King will slaughter your order to the last man, and then raise you all again bound to his will. There is no escaping his grasp. The whole of the world will fall-”

“Oh shut up,” Laiza said, rolling her eyes. “Blah blah blah, nobody escapes the Lich King, all hail the frozen throne, whatever. We’ll kill Arthas on our own time. Right now we’re worried about one of our own that’s gone missing.”

For a moment, the worgen’s jaw worked silently. She stared at Laiza in disbelief and snapped her jaw shut, refusing to speak.

“Don’t be like that,” Epyon said affably. He put his sword to Anatoly’s throat. The smile he gave Tatjana might have been called benevolent if he didn’t press the edge of it into Anatoly’s neck and draw blood.

Tatjana twitched like she wanted to go for his throat, but it was Anatoly who spoke up. “They say it is a worgen death knight they seek,” he said.

“Ah,” Tatjana said, her hackles settling slowly. “Yes, I know the one. She followed one of our long patrol scouts in two nights ago. She is quite mad - but also quite powerful.”
“She came to your village?” Laiza asked.

“She took over our village,” Tatjana corrected. She shifted her gaze to Anatoly. “Bores is dead. The death knight Kyladriss leads the pack, now.”

“Bores is dead?” Anatoly repeated, dismayed. “No... he was our best warrior!”

“No worgen is a match for a trained Knight of the Ebon Blade,” Epyon said.

Tatjana bared all her teeth in a vicious smile. “She will get what is coming to her soon enough.”

Saelessa flinched hard, and Necrothirst’s attention was drawn back to the two frost knights. “Hold still,” he said. “It will be even more painful if she sets a stitch in the wrong place because you could not stop moving.”

“It is not intentional,” Saelessa grated out through her clenched teeth.

“If you females would wear breastplates that actually cover your midsection, this would not have happened,” Necrothirst said dryly.

“It is not our fault that our ebon plate is cut for the feminine figure, it’s standard issue,” Tamasi said. “I think it is ridiculous as much as the next knight, but our alternative is commission a breastplate from a blacksmith - are you flush with gold?”

Necrothirst frowned. Gold was something all death knights lacked. Those that were rich in life found that their bankers did not care a whit whether being declared legally dead meant they could no longer access their funds.

“I am almost finished,” Tamasi said, perhaps sensing that Necrothirst was growing impatient. They knew where Kyladriss was now, and he wanted to move before something happened and she slipped through their grasp again. “Only a few more stitches.”

“Hurry,” Necrothirst said. “I mislike what the worgen implies. Something is coming.”

“Do not rush me,” Tamasi said. Despite her words, she did speed up her movements. They had all heard the female say that Kyladriss would get what was coming to her soon - they needed to get to that village.

“Dispatch the prisoners and prepare to move out,” Necrothirst said.

Someone shouted a denial. Tatjana leapt up from her seat on the ground. Anatoly shoved Epyon aside with a bestial roar and picked Laiza up with one hand by the top of her skull. Sasha fired her rifle, and the shot hit Anatoly between the eyes, dropping him like a stone. Tatjana collapsed over his body, howling with grief. Laiza pushed her way out from under the worgen’s body, cursing blackly.

“You didn’t have to do that!” Sasha yelled at him. “I mean, I would’ve shot him anyway but now how am I supposed to know where my sister is?!”

“If she is alive and not worgen, she will be in the village, obviously,” Necrothirst said. Tamasi looped the thread around her finger and snapped it off. Saelessa straightened, her expression pinched and tight. Necrothirst stepped back from her as soon as she stood under her own power, feeling strange. After the first few moments, he hadn’t even noticed she was kaldorei. Seeing her face again reminded him, but he felt only a twinge of annoyance, not the deep loathing that took him over before. “Shut that beast up before she brings the whole pack down on our head,” Necrothirst said, pushing his thoughts to the back of his mind.

Laiza stabbed the worgen through the chest. Tatjana’s grieved howling turned choked and wet, then went silent as her body slumped over her mate’s. Sasha chewed her lip, her face screwed up in a combination of disgust and sympathy.

“Mount up,” Necrothirst said. “We have a knight to retrieve.”

“I want to come,” Sasha said.

“We do not have the time to wait for you,” Necrothirst said shortly, mounting his raptor. “Knights, move out!”

Sasha shouted at them as they rode away, but Necrothirst did not stop. Tatjana’s ominous words rang in his ears. He could feel in his bones that something was not right in this part of the forest. There had to be a reason for the worgen to be there - and a reason for them to be loyal to the Lich King.

He held up his fist, signaling for the death knights to stop, and dismounted his raptor, drawing his sword in the same motion. The sounds of barks and low growls filled his ears. They were on the edge of Solstice Village, and he stepped warily in case there were guards about. To his surprise, it appeared that all the worgen were gathered in the central area of the village.

“Dear Elune,” Saelessa said from beside him. “She’s gone native.”

Kyladriss stood over the crowd of worgen, an impressive figure in her Ebon Blade plate armor. She had her clawed hands laced over the pommel of her sword, which stood upright with its point buried in the dirt. Her head was held high. Other worgen approached her cautiously, with their ears back, exchanging fearful glances as they placed what appeared to be the results of the night’s hunt in front of her. The sun had cleared the tops of the trees, and it reflected off the point of her runeblade as she used it to divide the carcasses of killed prey into different piles. As they watched, she waved her blade toward one of the kill piles, allowing a group of worgen to tuck in hungrily.

“You heard the worgen - she has taken over leadership of the pack. Look, though - they are not as deeply under her control as she thinks.”

Toward the back of the pack, where Kyladriss could not see them, several worgen were gathered around some kind of magical object. None of the knights could make out what they were saying, but whatever they were doing was concluded in a flash of brilliant light that made every worgen in the village turn to look. Kyladriss snarled, waving her blade, and the worgen parted in front of her to reveal the culprits.

“Get ready,” Necrothirst said. “Whatever is going to happen, it is happening now.”

Kyladriss swung her sword over her head, but before she could decapitate the ones that provoked her ire, there was a loud, long howl from the trees. A hulking worg with what looked like a man on its back burst into the clearing, scattering worgen in all directions. The man was translucent, almost transparent - clearly not of the living, at least not any longer.

His presence had an immediate effect on Kyladriss. Necrothirst could see the bloodlust even from where they hid in the trees, and stood from his hiding place as she threw herself at the shade and his worg. His knights broke cover with him as he ran to put his back to Kyladriss’s - the pack was rushing to the shade’s aid, not hers.

“Arugal!” Kyladriss snarled viciously, doing her level best to cleave the shade in two from his crown to his soles with her runeblade. The man laughed. It would have chilled his blood if it didn’t already stand still in his veins, but he concentrated on what was in front of him. His knights formed a loose semicircle around Kyladriss, who was fighting off both the shade and the worg. “Epyon, help her!” Necrothirst commanded, not sparing time to watch and see if the order was obeyed. The pack struggled to break through the death knights’ line, but Necrothirst kept their aggression focused on him while Laiza, Saelessa and Tamasi pared down their numbers.

“We are outnumbered!” Tamasi said. “We cannot keep this up!” She fought with enough ferocity for two death knights, putting herself between Saelessa and as many of her enemies as she could. Saelessa’s strikes were sluggish and pained.

“Kill him or go, Kyladriss!” Necrothirst snapped. “We do not have time for you to play with your prey!”

He did not know whether she understood him or not. The smell of blood, disease and unwashed fur filled the air. He mindlessly parried and dodged blows, striking out with his runeblade and draining health from whoever he struck. He could withstand this for a short while longer, but the pack’s numbers were large, and even he would be overwhelmed eventually.

From behind him, he heard a cry of anguish. Kyladriss let out a vicious, growling laugh, a sound made even more unsettling by the death knight echo to her voice. Necrothirst risked a glance over his shoulder and found that she had impaled the shade on her runeblade. Her bared teeth were inches from the shade’s face as it faded away and dissipated into the morning sunlight.

The influence of Arugal’s shade was broken. The pack of worgen stopped fighting cohesively. Some broke and ran. Some threw themselves on the line of death knights and were quickly dispatched for their troubles. Most turned on each other. Any worgen who had managed to maintain a human form lost it now. It seemed that all semblance of sanity had been removed from them, and they devolved into beasts. Necrothirst kept a wary eye on the in-fighting but turned to face Kyladriss.

She stood staring at the spot where the shade had been, panting heavily, her runeblade still gripped tightly in both hands.

“Kyladriss,” Necrothirst said.

She spun to face him, ears flat, teeth bared, sword at the ready. He stood calmly, stepping up into her space until they were practically nose to nose, staring directly into her glowing blue eyes with his own. She growled. He didn’t move. She raised her sword to swing it at him, and his hand darted out and closed on her throat. He bared his own teeth, still staring into her eyes.

“Necrothirst,” Tamasi said, reminding him that they needed to go. He nodded, not breaking eye contact, indicating that he’d heard her. Kyladriss had not yet yielded to him, and he would not look away until she did. Slowly, her lips fell back down over her teeth, and she lowered her sword. Finally, she shifted her eyes to the side, laying her ears back with a soft whine.

Necrothirst released her throat. “If I have to chase you down and recover you again, I will take it as a sign that your life is too much trouble to maintain,” he told her. Kyladriss’s ears twitched a bit and she glanced at him and away quickly, as if she was saying she understood. He nodded sharply and summoned his raptor. “If we do not reach Light’s Breach by nightfall, we will be late and they will report us to our superiors. Mount up and move out.”

“Are you sure it’s wise to leave her loose?” Laiza asked, eyeing Kyladriss. Kyladriss bared her teeth at the gnome and growled. Necrothirst thumped her pauldron with his fist and she stopped. “Huh,” Laiza said. “All right then.”

“She simply needed an alpha,” Tamasi said, mounting her Deathcharger.

Necrothirst was not so sure, but for now it appeared that Kyladriss would obey his orders. He hoped it would last until Light’s Breach. It would be a shame to have to kill her after all this.

Grizzly Hills

Steam huffed from the nostrils of Necrothirst’s riding raptor, curling up into the cold evening air of Grizzly Hills. It shook its head hard, the feathers from its armor rustling together, and dug its talons into the snow.

The other four death knights rode Deathchargers, undead horses that would go forever if you bade them. No steam rose from their nostrils, nor from the faces of the knights as they rode single file through the icy foothills.

“How can you be certain she came this way?” Epyon asked from where he rode, just behind Necrothirst. “I haven’t seen any tracks.”

“There was a snowstorm last night,” Laiza said from behind him. “Any tracks there were are long gone. We saw her running in this direction, so until we find out otherwise we’ll just assume she went this way.”

“I am more interested to know what a pack of worgen is doing in Northrend,” Saelessa said. “After all the care we took to lock them away in the Dream, they should not be roaming Azeroth at all, much less this far removed from civilization-”

“Never underestimate the ingenuity and academic stupidity of mages,” Necrothirst said, interrupting her. So far he had been able to stand her presence; she rarely spoke, so he could mostly forget she was there. “They were likely summoned by some monumentally bookish idiot who simply wanted to see if he could.”

“You mean you wouldn’t want a vicious army of wolf-men who were likely to turn on you and rip you apart at a moment’s notice?” Epyon asked, his tone innocent. Laiza snickered.

“Quiet,” Necrothirst said. “If they are nearby, we do not want them to pinpoint our location because you were unable to stop talking.”

He glanced back in time to see Epyon make an exaggerated, mocking gesture. Laiza clapped her hands over her mouth, trying to stifle her laughter. Both of them sat straight up in the saddle when they noticed Necrothirst glaring at them.

After Kyladriss disappeared, they returned to Valgarde Keep and were met with profuse thanks from the fort commander. The Vrykul seige was pushed back into their village for the time being, freeing up men to take supply runs up the river. The death knights left shortly afterward to track down their wayward blood knight. Necrothirst did not want to write the report to Thassarian saying he lost her. A day’s ride took them up the river to the border of Grizzly Hills.

Necrothirst wanted to find her and recover her before they were due to report to Light’s Breach in Zul’Drak. If they were late reporting in, a message to that effect would certainly be sent back to Ebon Hold. The trouble, of course, was that they had no idea where the worgen had gone. They didn’t know whether she was still with the other, wild worgen or if she had found a village to slaughter. Normally it would be easy to find an out-of-control blood knight - one would simply follow the path of destruction. The fact that Kyladriss went to ground so thoroughly - and so quietly - made Necrothirst think that she was not as out-of-control as they supposed.

The sun slipped below the treeline, bathing Grizzly Hills in shadowy dusk. Mortal riders would need rest, but Necrothirst and his knights pressed on, riding into the descending chill without feeling it. They skirted the edge of the small mountain range on the southern end of Grizzly Hills, keeping their eyes open for signs of their wayward worgen. So far the ride was quiet, a far cry from the breakneck chase through the woods of the day before.

The night was fully on them, stars peppering the black sky above, when Laiza said, “I don’t like this.”

“I do not ask you to like it,” Necrothirst said gruffly.

“No, I mean, there’s something wrong. This is a forest, right? So we should be hearing owls or something, but I haven’t heard anything for some time.”

“With the size of the dragons on this continent, I’m not sure they even have owls,” Epyon muttered, but Laiza shook her head.

“It’s more than that. I haven’t seen any deer, or squirrels, or anything. It’s like the countryside has been hunted bare.”

Necrothirst reined in his raptor and the column of knights stopped behind him. Without the sound of their hoofs crunching in the snow, he tilted his head and listened hard. Their armor creaked as they leaned forward in their saddles, trying to hear something...

“Dismount!” Necrothirst shouted, and his raptor vanished in a puff of smoke. He whipped Zin’Shalla out of its sheath and stabbed it skyward, a shield of floating bone coming down to surround him. Behind him, he heard a corpse rising out of the ground at Laiza’s bidding. Epyon laid a circle of death and decay at their feet.

“Did you hear something?” Laiza whispered.

“Hush,” Tamasi said, drawing her twin runeblades. “We are being hunted.”

The death knights put their backs toward each other, standing in a loose circle. Now that they were listening for it, they could hear the almost silent rustling of leaves and loose rocks. Tamasi was right - they were being stalked in the darkness.

A snarl and the light of two glowing yellow eyes was the only warning they got before half a dozen worgen leapt from their places. Four came from the shadowy treeline and two more charged over the crest of a low hill. They met the group of death knights in a mass of black fur, long claws and wicked fangs.

Necrothirst struck for the nearest worgen’s heart, opening a long gash across its chest. The beast howled and retreated a bare foot before going for him again, another worgen attempting to overwhelm him from the side. He parried, keeping his sword between him and their claws. Tamasi and Saelessa were contending with a pair of female worgen behind him. To his right, Laiza and her ghoul danced around a rangy grey male. Epyon and Necrothirst stood shoulder-to-shoulder, taking on the remaining three at once.

“Don’t kill them if you can help it!” Necrothirst shouted. “See if you can force them to retreat! We can follow them back to their lair!”

“Now you tell me,” Laiza grumbled, yanking her runeblade out of the rangy worgen’s chest. Her ghoul fell upon the corpse immediately, ripping into it greedily. Necrothirst parried a blow from the worgen he’d wounded and swung his sword over his head, his teeth bared. The blow separated the worgen’s head from its shoulders, its headless corpse collapsing at Necrothirst’s feet.

One of the females barked, and the remaining four worgen broke and ran into the night. Necrothirst lifted his hand and summoned his raptor, snapping its reins. The mount took off after the worgen. Hoofbeats behind him told him that his squad followed on his heels, but Necrothirst didn’t dare take his eyes off the worgen. Night made it difficult to track the dark shapes as they flitted in and out of the trees.

He raised his gauntleted hand and gestured sharply to either side. Tamasi and Saelessa peeled off to one side, Laiza and Epyon to the other, attempting to come up beside the worgen and flank them. This would work a lot better if we had a place we were herding them to-

The sharp crack of a rifle broke through the sounds of chase, and a moment later Necrothirst’s raptor leapt over the fallen corpse of a worgen. “Filthy beasts!” someone shouted - a young, female voice. “Get back here so I can shoot you!”

Necrothirst’s raptor skidded to a halt, his death knights fanning out behind him. The source of the voice was a human girl, perhaps thirteen. She gripped a rifle in white-knuckled hands, her lip trembling as Necrothirst dismissed his raptor, his booted feet crunching in the fallen tree needles. “Stay back!” she said, leveling her rifle at him. “I know how to use this and I’m not scared to!”

“Calm down, kid,” Laiza said, dismounting her Deathcharger. “We’re with the Ebon Blade, not the Scourge.”

Tamasi nudged the fallen worgen with her hoof, turning him over. She let out a low, admiring noise when she saw the killing shot. The girl’s shot had hit him in the chest, right over the heart.

“You do know how to use that,” Epyon chuckled. “A heart shot on a moving target in the dark? Who taught you to shoot like that?”

“My father,” the girl said defiantly. Her lip still quivered, but she slowly lowered the rifle, apparently accepting that she wasn’t about to be killed and turned into a banshee.

“What are you doing in the woods by yourself at night? Northrend is a dangerous country,” Necrothirst said. He shouldered past the girl, ignoring her twitch of protest. Behind her was a watch tower that looked like it was abandoned save for her small campfire. “Where is your father?”

“He’s dead,” the girl said flatly. “The worgen killed him.”

“Ah,” Necrothirst said, regarding her with his cool blue gaze. The steel in her eyes now made perfect sense. “So you have come here to avenge him? One small girl against a pack of worgen?”

“I’m a good shot,” the girl said stubbornly. “I’ve been dealing with them as I can. I even captured one.”

“What is your name?” Saelessa asked. She sheathed her swords and came to stand next to Necrothirst. He took a step to the side and turned away from her.

“Sasha,” the girl said, not noticing or just ignoring the subtleties between the death knights. “I used to live in Solstice Village before... before everyone started changing.”

“Changing?” Saelessa asked. Necrothirst looked around the encampment. He was more than happy to let Saelessa coddle the girl if that is what she so desired.

“Into those,” Sasha said, indicating the dead worgen with her rifle. “We didn’t know, at first. People started acting kind of strange. One of them lost control in the town square and father shot it - that was when - that was when-”

The girl stopped talking, apparently unable to continue. So the worgen curse had slowly spread through the village without their knowledge, and the girl’s father was torn apart by the pack for what he thought was defending his people.

“Tragic, but in the past now,” Necrothirst said. “Take me to this prisoner.”

Saelessa speared him with a cold blue glare, but Sasha wiped her eyes and straightened, clearing her throat. “This way,” she said.

It was then that Necrothirst noticed the man sitting in the shadows beside Sasha’s campfire. Sasha approached him warily, her rifle trained on him. He ignored her, watching Necrothirst approach with apprehension in his eyes. When they stopped before him, the man bared his teeth in a bestial smile. “So you have finally accepted your fate is to join the Scourge,” he said. “Good.”

“I haven’t accepted anything,” Sasha snapped. “They’re Ebon Blade.”

“Traitors,” the man growled. “The Lich King will have you-”

Necrothirst’s blade was off his back and at the man’s throat in a heartbeat, his cold eyes holding the human’s over the length of the blade. The man growled in the back of his throat and for a moment a flickering red glow lit up his eyes. “Interesting,” Necrothirst said. “The other worgen I encountered did not seem to be able to speak. They certainly did not take human form.”

The man said nothing. Sasha glanced between him and Necrothirst and licked her lips. “His name is Anatoly,” she said. “I know him from our village. I was able to catch him with a tranquilizer dart the other day, but I haven’t been able to get him to say anything useful. Those beasts have my little sister Anya in the village still, and I need to find her-”

“If she is in the village, she is either worgen or dead,” Necrothirst said, taking his sword away from the man’s throat. “And if you captured this thing days ago, he does not know anything of use to me.”

Sasha glared at him, her grip going white on her rifle again. “She’s not dead!”

“Believe what you will,” Necrothirst said. “You, beast. You have not seen a worgen death knight?”

“Worgen death knight? I would know if any of our village was selected by the Lich King for such an honor,” the man said. “You’ve spurned his generosity and you will pay-”

Necrothirst raised his sword again and the worgen’s teeth clicked together. “We must capture another one,” he said. “One who has met with the pack more recently.”

Sasha dug through her packs and produced a tiny needle fletched with small feathers. “This is my last dart,” she said. “Anatoly had a wife when he was still human-”

“She is still my mate!” the man snapped, and Necrothirst put his sword to his throat again. He fell silent.

“As I was saying, Anatoly’s wife is named Tatjana. If you capture her, I’m sure we could make them say something useful.”

Necrothirst smirked. “Rather bloody-minded for such a young girl,” he said. “Very well. Laiza!”

The gnome broke off from where she was speaking with Epyon and saluted sharply. “Yes sir?”

“Take this dart and recover a female worgen by the name of Tatjana. You may have to scout the encampment for some time before you figure out which one she is. Be careful with the dart, the girl says it’s her last one.”

“Yes sir,” Laiza said, and waved Saelessa over. They exited the circle of firelight together and were swallowed by the shadows of the forest.

Necrothirst sheathed his sword and settled down by the fire. “Now we wait,” he said. “If you value your life, you should hope your mate has something useful to say.”

Anatoly growled again from across the fire. Sasha got up, muttered an excuse about keeping watch, and left the firelight. A moment later, he heard Epyon’s low voice exchanging conversation with her.

“Remarkably resilient for a young one, isn’t she?” Tamasi asked, sitting down next to him. She pulled one of her runeblades from its sheath and fished a whetstone from her packs, setting about sharpening the blade. “Humans never cease to surprise me.”

Necrothirst grunted. The girl was young, but she was a good shot and she seemed to be handling herself well. He had campaigned with worse.

“I have a matter that I wish to speak to you about,” Tamasi said when she realized Necrothirst was not going to answer her. “Saelessa.”

Necrothirst glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, but she merely continued to sharpen her blade. “What about her?”

“You act as if she carries Plague every time she comes near you.”

“Does it trouble you?” Necrothirst stared into the fire, occasionally glancing at the worgen sitting on the other side of it. He made no move to escape, simply watched them.

“We were raised in death very near one another. We have become like sisters. I would like to know what she has done.”

Necrothirst was silent for a very long moment, watching sparks leap from the fire onto the bare earth around it. “She has done nothing,” he finally admitted with difficulty. “It is simply an old wound.”

Tamasi ran her whetstone down the length of her sword and then paused, tapping her hoof against the dirt. “I have made it a personal policy not to pry into the past of my fellow knights,” she said.

“A good policy. You should keep it.”

Tamasi shook her head, firelight reflecting off her horns. “She has done nothing to you personally, yet every time you see her it is like you are barely containing your rage. Is it a quarrel with your people?”

“You should stop now, while your head is still attached to your shoulders,” Necrothirst growled.

Tamasi shrugged. “Simply know that I understand old wounds. I have many.” The draenei sheathed her first sword and drew her second. “Our people, too, were betrayed by our own.”

“Do not presume to understand me or my past,” Necrothirst said.

“I do not mean to,” Tamasi said peaceably, continuing to sharpen. “You misunderstand my intent. I came to determine whether there was an improvement Saelessa could make, but I understand now that it is simply her species you disagree with. Might I remind you that you are still kaldorei?”

“I am a death knight,” Necrothirst snapped, rising abruptly from his seat by the fire. “No more. I hold no allegiance that I held in life. I fight for the Ebon Blade. That is all.”

“Very well,” Tamasi said. Many would have immediately fallen silent, wary of his temper, but she acted like his outburst had not troubled her at all. Necrothirst was unused to dealing with someone who had as many years as he - someone who was not ruffled by displays of emotion. He strode past the worgen out of the firelight, putting the man at his back and staring out into the night with the sounds of Tamasi sharpening her sword ringing in the silence. A long moment passed before she spoke again. “Saelessa was simply a sentinel. She had no say in the decisions of night elf command. It is unfair to blame her for them.”

Necrothirst did not answer. Many had disagreed with the decisions of night elf command, but none had spoken out. Saelessa was as guilty by her silence as command was for their decisions. The words of one draenei could not soothe thousands of years of rage and hatred, and Necrothirst would not entertain them.